Saudi Arabia Pictures

Saudi Arabia Pictures

Saudi Arabia Pictures

Saudi Arabia Pictures

Saudi Arabia Pictures

Saudi Arabia Pictures

Saudi Arabia Pictures

Saudi Arabia Pictures

Saudi Arabia Pictures

This Nov. 30, 2014, image made from video released by Loujain al-Hathloul, shows her driving toward the United Arab Emirates–Saudi Arabia border before her arrest on Dec. 1, 2014, in Saudi Arabia

Chip Somodevilla—Getty Images

Saudi Arabia&#039;s King Abdullah receives U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates at the king&#039;s Riyadh Palace on April 6, 2011 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Loujain al-Hathloul—AP

This Nov. 30, 2014 image made from video released by Loujain al-Hathloul, shows her driving towards the United Arab Emirates - Saudi Arabia border before her arrest on Dec. 1, 2014, in Saudi Arabia.

Lorenzo Scaraggi / Getty Images

American peace activist Rachel Corrie speaks during an interview with MBC Saudi Arabia television March 14, 2003 in the Rafah refugee camp in the Gaza Strip. Corrie was run over and killed by an Israeli bulldozer two days later when she tried to stop it from destroying a Palestinian house in Rafah.

Dmitri Kessel—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

The caption that accompanied this image when it appeared in LIFE: "Young couple from North Dakota, Mr. and Mrs. Thomas C. Barger live at Dammam, a town of 1,000 people on the east coast of Saudi Arabia. Barger is an assistant 'government relations' man with Arabian American [oil company]. His air-conditioned three-room bunkhouse, made of frame and native masonry, was built for him by the company and most of his furniture is company owned. Virtually every American family can afford several servants, generally imported Indians or Sudanese who receive $20 a month. Barger has been in Saudi Arabia for nine years."

MARWAN NAAMANI/AFP/Getty Images

Saudi Arabia has the richest reserves of oil on the planet

Dmitri Kessel—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

The caption that accompanied this image when it appeared in LIFE: "Aramco's newest well in Saudi Arabia is at Qatif, will bring in 10,000 barrels per day. Square patches in the foreground are date gardens."

Bob Daugherty / AP FILE

General H. Norman Schwarzkopf, commander of U.S. troops in the Gulf, gazes from the window of his small jet on his way out to visit U.S. troops in the desert in Saudi Arabia on Jan. 13, 1991. Schwarzkopf died Thursday, Dec. 27, 2012 in Tampa, Fla. He was 78.

Dmitri Kessel—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

The caption that accompanied this image when it appeared in LIFE: "Aramco's [Saudi Arabian Oil Company] two refineries in Saudi Arabia: old plant (foreground) refines 3,000 barrels daily. New refinery (background) has capacity of 50,000 barrels daily."

Franco Pagetti / VII for TIME

King Abdullah Economic City being built in Saudi Arabia, when completed. in 20 years, it will be the size of Washington DC and have a projected population of over 1.4 million people.

AFP / Getty

Vice President Dick Cheney walks with Saudi King Abdullah, in Tabuk, Saudi Arabia, May 12, 2007. The man between them is a translator.

Phil Noble / Reuters

Saudi Arabia's Prince Mohamed bin Nawaf bin Abdulaziz seen in London in 2011.

FRANCK FIFE / AFP / Getty Images

Saudi Arabia's Sarah Attar competes in the women's 800m heats at the athletics event of the London 2012 Olympic Games on August 8, 2012 in London.

AFP / Getty

Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah, left, and Syrian President Bashar Assad at al-Shaab palace in Damascus on Oct. 7, 2009

Ronald Zak / AP

Saudi Arabia's Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources Ali Ibrahim Naimi speaks to journalists prior to the start of the OPEC meeting at their headquarters in Vienna, Austria, Tuesday Sept. 9, 2008.

Saudi Arabian Ambassador to the United States Adel Al-Jubeir speaks during a news conference at the Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia in Washington on March 25, 2015.

Eric Bouvet—Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images

U.S. M-1 tanks in the desert in Saudi Arabia on September 13th, 1990.

Kevin Lamarque—Reuters

U.S. President Barack Obama speaks on the phone with Saudi Arabia&#039;s King Abdullah from the Oval Office of the White House before giving a speech to the natoin on ISIS, in Washington on Sept. 10, 2014.

Dmitri Kessel—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

Not published in LIFE. Saudi Arabia, 1945.

Dmitri Kessel—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

Not published in LIFE. Saudi Arabia, 1945.

Aldo Pavan / Lonely Planet Images / Getty Images

Townscape from Burj Al-Mamlaka tower in the city of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Waseem Obaidi / Bloomberg via Getty Images

The Kingdom Tower illuminated at night on King Fahad Road in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on Monday, April 9, 2012.

HO / AFP / Getty Images

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, left, welcomes Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari in Riyadh in 2008

BROOKS KRAFT/CORBIS FOR TIME

Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister Prince Saud al Faisal

BROOKS KRAFT/CORBIS FOR TIME

Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal, leaves the White House after meeting with President Bush

Mohammed Mahjoub / AFP / Getty

King Abdullah bin Abdel Aziz of Saudi Arabia.

(L to R) Marwan Naamani / AFP / Getty ; News of the World

Phelps at a press conference in Saudi Arabia in January, left, and in a photo published by "News of the World"

CHRISTOPHER MORRIS /VII FOR TIME

RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s capital, as seen from the 99th-floor of one city tower, has sustained its own share of attacks

AP

Rumsfeld meets Saudi Arabia's Prince Sultan bin Abdul Aziz

AFP / Getty Images

An image from Bahrain TV shows troops traveling across a causeway from Saudi Arabia to Bahrain on March 14, 2011

Not published in LIFE. Aerial view of the Ras Tenura oil refinery, Saudi Arabia, 1945.

Mast Irham / EPA

Illegal migrant workers who were being prepared to be sent to Saudi Arabia are gathered after a raid by Indonesian police on a shelter run by a migrant worker placement company. Indonesia is considering a moratorium on sending migrant workers to Saudi Arabia in the wake of the Saudi Arabian execution of Indonesian maid Ruyati Binti Sapubi for murdering her employer.

Vahid Salemi / AP

A nuclear power reactor in Bushehr, Iran. The diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks reportedly show King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia urging the U.S. to attack Iran and destroy its nuclear program

Photograph for TIME by Kate Brooks

"Dress code" At media company Rotana, female workers can choose whether or not to cover up. But when they leave the mixed-sex office, they must follow Saudi Arabia's strict laws

Stephanie Sinclair for TIME

A follower of Sharif takes part in a demo to protest his hero's deportation. Sharif flew from London to Islamabad after seven years in exile, but was sent to Saudi Arabia after just four hours on the ground

Lynsey Addario / VII for TIME

Fouz Awadh al Khamdi, a Saudi TV anchor, talks with colleagues after shooting a live segment at the Ministry of Information in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on Feb. 25, 2013.

Hassan Ammar / AP

Muslim pilgrims pray on a rocky hill called the Mountain of Mercy on the Plain of Arafat near the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia, Thursday, Oct. 25, 2012.

Lynsey Addario / VII for TIME

Saudi guides walk through the old city in Al Ula, near Maidan e Saleh, the UNESCO World Heritage site, in the Madinah region of Saudi Arabia, March 2, 2013.

Hassan Ammar / AFP / Getty

Young Saudi men released from Guantanamo Bay as well as prisons in Iraq and Saudi Arabia listen to a Muslim cleric during a course at a rehabilitation center near Riyadh

Reuters

More than 100 mostly young men defied a ban on demonstrations in the main Shi'ite city of Qatif, Saudi Arabia, March 9th, 2011.

Colin Powell visits the scene of a suicide attack at a housing compound in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Brooks Kraft / Corbis for TIME

President Bush and Saudi King Abdullah watch a display of the King's horses at Al Janadriyah Farm in Al Janadriyah, Saudi Arabia

Dmitri Kessel—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

The caption that accompanied this image when it appeared in LIFE: "Johnny Ramirez, foreman from Montebello, Calif., has been drilling for oil for 30 years. Before drifting to Saudi Arabia, he worked in California fields and Netherlands East Indies."

Mosab Omar / Reuters

A woman speaks on her BlackBerry at a mall in Dubai on Aug. 2, 2010. Key services of the smart phone may be cut off for more than a million BlackBerry users in Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E.

Ammar Awad / Reuters

Antigovernment protesters spray foam and wave the national flag in Sana'a on June 5, 2011, in celebration of Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh's departure to Saudi Arabia